Building Strong Study Skills Series: Effective Note Taking

Note: This series details how to study smarter, not harder, to help students succeed in their academics. All information in this series draws upon principles from psychological research on learning and memory.

Students often ask me about how to take better notes. I often notice that these students use the outline method, where they write their notes bullet-by-bullet and organize the notes with headings.

While the outline method is not terrible, it also isn’t the most effective way to take notes. A better option is the Cornell method, which is one of the most effective note taking techniques.

Proper Technique

Create two columns on a page. The left column should be 2.5” wide and the right should be 6” wide. And leave a 2” tall space at the bottom. Don’t agonize over these proportions, though.

Take notes in the right column. And add comments, questions, and key terms to the left column. Then write a brief 2-4 sentence summary of the notes at the bottom of the page.

Comments can look like “important!,” “will be tested on this,” “this relates to concept x,” etc. Write a question in the left column when you don’t understand something. Or write questions that test for understanding.

Tips for Success

There are two very important tips when it comes to notetaking. Write the notes in your own words. And, review your notes repeatedly until your test. Always review notes on the same day that you took them. Then review them the next day and every few days after that.

Don’t write everything you see and hear in lecture. This is a surefire way to get overwhelmed and miss content. At the same time, don’t write too little. If your notes are too sparse, it will be difficult to study from them.

Write short, succinct sentences. To save time, try using abbreviations and symbols that you will understand later when you are reviewing your notes.

Handwriting your notes is more effective for learning than typing notes. However, if you have handwriting that you have trouble reading, then typing your notes will be just fine.

Why It Works

Cornell notes are extremely organized, which helps organize your understanding of the material. The structure of the notes provide the perfect study guide, too! Use those comments, questions, and key-terms written in the left column to test yourself on the content in the right column. And be sure to review your summaries at the bottom of the page.

Summary

The Cornell note taking technique is highly effective and doubles as a study guide. It can be challenging to use at first, but will become easier with practice.

Keep up with our weekly Building Strong Study Skills series to learn the most effective study strategies and succeed in your academics. Schedule a session with one of our expert tutors today to receive all the information and guidance you need to gain a deeper understanding of your academics and perform better on your tests! Building effective study habits takes time, so the sooner you get help, the better prepared you will be by the time finals roll around.

Read Other Articles in The Building Strong Study Skills Series

Sources:

• Terry, W.S. (2018). Learning and Memory: Basic Principles, Processes, and Procedures, Fifth Edition. New York, Routledge, a Taylor and Francis Group. ISBN 978-1-13-864591-2.
• Rhodes, M.G., Cleary, A.M. and DeLosh, E.L. (2020). A Guide to Effective Studying and Learning: Practical Strategies from the Science of Learning. New York, Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-021447-0 (pbk).

Building Strong Study Skills Series: Flashcards

Note: This study skills series details how to study smarter, not harder, to help students succeed in their academics. All information in this series draws upon principles from psychological research on learning and memory.

Flashcards were probably one of the first study skills you ever used. They’re relatively easy to make and easy to study from. But many students don’t use flashcards to their full potential. In this article, we’ll talk about ways to use flashcards more effectively to optimize your study time.

Proper Technique

When a student uses flashcards properly, they naturally employ the self-testing technique:

Flashcards work best when the questions and answers are self-created. To do this, write questions that you came up with and write the answers in your own words. Don’t simply copy questions and answers from your book.

If you have a study guide with written questions, then at least write the answers to those questions in your own words on your flashcards. However, to make your set of flashcards more effective, consider adding self-created questions.

Tips for Success

Write free-response questions instead of questions that elicit multiple choice or true-false answers.

Why It Works

Students encode the information through the very process of making flashcards. Students further encode that information when they come up with answers to their questions. Also, research shows that the most powerful type of learning occurs when students retrieve information from their memory. 

Summary

When used properly, students use flashcards to self-test. Self-testing and spaced practice are the two most effective study skills. But they’re not the only study skills, and should still be used with other techniques:

Keep up with our weekly Building Strong Study Skills series to learn the most effective study strategies and succeed in your academics. Schedule a session with one of our expert tutors today to receive all the information and guidance you need to gain a deeper understanding of your academics and perform better on your tests! Building effective study habits takes time, so the sooner you get help, the better prepared you will be by the time finals roll around.

Read Other Articles in The Building Strong Study Skills Series

Sources:

• Terry, W.S. (2018). Learning and Memory: Basic Principles, Processes, and Procedures, Fifth Edition. New York, Routledge, a Taylor and Francis Group. ISBN 978-1-13-864591-2.
• Rhodes, M.G., Cleary, A.M. and DeLosh, E.L. (2020). A Guide to Effective Studying and Learning: Practical Strategies from the Science of Learning. New York, Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-021447-0 (pbk).

Building Strong Study Skills Series:
Spaced Practice

Note: This series details how to study smarter, not harder, to help students succeed in their academics. All information in this series draws upon principles from psychological research on learning and memory.

Have you ever put off studying for a test until the night before? How much caffeine did it take to get through the hours of studying? How many hours of sleep did you lose to studying? And do you remember any of the material that you studied?

Studying all of your material in a session right before the test is called massed practice, or cramming. Spaced practice is the exact opposite of cramming and offers significant benefits.

Proper Technique

Spaced practice consists of breaking up your studying into smaller sessions over a longer period of time. It is usually recommended that students study their material on days that they don’t have the class they’re studying for.

For example, if a student has a test in two weeks, a good study practice would be to study, say, 60 minutes on each day that the student does not have that class. If there are four days each week that a student doesn’t have class, that adds up to eight hours of studying!

But students shouldn’t study for a particular subject for 60 minutes straight – they should interleave their studying with other topics.

Tips for Success

Students need to be on top of their studies in order to use spaced practice effectively. Plan out your study days and times to make sure you are on track and prepared for your test. Our tutors are the perfect resource for developing better study habits and can help you make study plans.

Why It Works

Research shows that studying for a total of five hours over a two week period, as opposed to five hours before the test, gives students a greater ability to learn the material and helps them retain the knowledge for a longer period of time.

But why? Learning and memory researchers have a couple leading explanations. The first is that studying for a long period of time offers diminishing returns; or, the longer you study, the less effective it is. After a while, the subject becomes monotonous and students lose focus.

The second theory explains that spaced practice provides a framework of reminding. The more a student is reminded of their material, the stronger their memories of that material become. And, frequent reminding also provides the student with more opportunities to make connections among different ideas.

Summary

Cramming is not a good study habit. Spaced practice provides students with better results and retention of material. And it’s easy to implement! Contact us today to begin building more effective study habits with one of our tutors.

Read Other Articles in The Building Strong Study Skills Series

Sources:

• Terry, W.S. (2018). Learning and Memory: Basic Principles, Processes, and Procedures, Fifth Edition. New York, Routledge, a Taylor and Francis Group. ISBN 978-1-13-864591-2.
• Rhodes, M.G., Cleary, A.M. and DeLosh, E.L. (2020). A Guide to Effective Studying and Learning: Practical Strategies from the Science of Learning. New York, Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-021447-0 (pbk).